Republic of Hawaii
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The Republic of Hawaiʻi was the formal name of the government that controlled Hawaiʻi from 1894 to 1898 when it was run as a republic. The republic period occurred between the administration of the Provisional Government of Hawaiʻi which ended on July 4, 1894 and the adoption of the Newlands Resolution in the United States Congress in which the Republic was annexed to the United States and became the Territory of Hawaiʻi on July 7, 1898.
The administration of the Republic of Hawaiʻi was multiracial. It included men of European ancestry, like Sanford B. Dole and Lorrin A. Thurston, who were both native-born subjects of the Hawaiian kingdom and fluent speakers of the Hawaiian language. Dole had previously been an elected member of the Kingdom legislature from Koloa, Kauaʻi and a Justice of the Kingdom's Supreme Court. Thurston had served as Minister of Interior under King Kalākaua. The Speaker of the House of the Republic of Hawaiʻi was native Hawaiian John Kaulukou who had previously been a Royalist opposing annexation.
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[edit] Blount Investigation
The first order of business for the Provisional Government after the successful overthrow of Liliʻuokalani was to form an interim government while Lorrin A. Thurston was in Washington, DC to negotiate annexation with Congress. One group proposed the assumption of power of Princess Victoria Kaʻiulani while a body formed by the Committee of Safety could act as a regency government. With the physical absence of the princess from the islands, the proposal was immediately struck down.
The Provisional Government was dealt a huge blow when United States President Benjamin Harrison, who was supportive of the annexation of Hawaii, was voted out of the White House. Grover Cleveland, an anti-imperialist, assumed the presidency and right away worked to stop the treaty of annexation. Just a month before Cleveland became president, Lorrin A. Thurston had struck a deal with Congress as it prepared to ratify a treaty of annexation. Cleveland, having heard the appeals of Princess Victoria Kaʻiulani on behalf of her imprisoned aunt, withdrew the treaty and launched an investigation of the matter.
Cleveland appointed James Henderson Blount of Macon, Georgia as Commissioner Paramount and Minister to Hawaiʻi. His chief mission was to investigate the overthrow of Liliʻuokalani's government. Blount concluded in his report that the overthrow had utilized the aid of the John L. Stevens, United States Minister to Hawaiʻi who ordered the landing of troops from the USS Boston. On the basis of Blount's report, Cleveland sent Albert Sydney Willis of Kentucky to Honolulu as Minister to Hawaiʻi with secret instructions. Willis, initially rebuffed by the queen, obtained Liliʻuokalani's promise to grant an amnesty after a considerable delay. After securing that promise, Willis made a formal demand for the dissolution of the Provisional Government and complete restoration of the monarchy, although unbeknownst to him by that time it was too late since Cleveland had already referred the matter to Congress. Taking the demand at face value, on December 23, 1893, Sanford B. Dole sent a reply to Willis flatly refusing to surrender the authority of the Provisional Government to the deposed queen.[1]
[edit] Morgan Investigation
In response to Cleveland's referral of the matter, the Senate passed a resolution empowering its Foreign Relations Committee to hold public hearings under oath, and cross-examine witnesses, to investigate U.S. involvement in the revolution and also to investigate whether it had been proper for President Cleveland to appoint Blount and give him extraordinary powers to represent the U.S. and intervene in Hawaiʻi without Senate confirmation. Senator John Tyler Morgan chaired the investigation.
The findings of the Morgan Report contradicted the assertions earlier made by Blount and Cleveland, and on February 26, 1894 was submitted. It concluded that the U.S. troops had remained completely neutral during the overthrow, exonerated Minister Stevens in landing troops, and concluded Blount's appointment and investigation without congressional approval were constitutional. However, the nine member Senate Foreign Relations Committee that submitted the report could not agree on a final conclusion, and the oft-executive summary was signed only by Morgan himself.[2][3].
Following the Morgan Report, and the Turpie Resolution on May 31, 1894 in which Congress prohibited any further intervention by the president and other government officials against the Provisional Government of Hawaiʻi,[dubious ] Cleveland officially recognized the Provisional Government.
[edit] Establishment of the Republic
The Provisional Government feared that Grover Cleveland might continue interfering in the internal affairs of Hawaiʻi by trying to restore the monarchy. The Provisional Government also realized there would be no annexation until Grover Cleveland's term of office ended; and they wanted to establish a more permanent government for the continuing independent nation of Hawaiʻi. Therefore the Provisional Government called to order a Constitutional Convention on May 30, 1894. The Constitutional Convention drafted a constitution for a Republic of Hawaiʻi. The Republic of Hawaiʻi was proclaimed on 4 July 1894 at Aliʻiōlani Hale. Sanford B. Dole became president.
[edit] Wilcox Rebellion of 1895
Main article: Wilcox rebellions
Hawaiian revolutionary Robert William Wilcox led several rebellions in pursuit of the restoration of the Hawaiian monarchy. He led an army of 150 Hawaiians, Europeans and Chinese in an attempt in 1889. Wilcox was brought to trial but released as juries refused to find him guilty of wrongdoing. In 1895, Wilcox participated in another attempt, this time to overthrow the Republic of Hawaiʻi and to restore Liliʻuokalani to power. Royalist supporters landed a cargo of arms and ammunition from San Francisco, California in a secret Honolulu location. At the location on January 6, 1895, a company of royalists met to draft plans to capture the government buildings by surprise. A premature encounter with a squad of police alarmed Honolulu and the plans were abandoned as the royalists were quickly routed. Wilcox spent several days in hiding in the mountains before being captured. The son of one pro-annexationist was killed. Several other skirmishes occurred during the following week resulting in the capture of the leading conspirators and their followers. The government allegedly found arms and ammunition and some potentially evidential documents on the premises of Washington Place, Liliʻuokalani's private residence implicating her in the plot.
[edit] Liliʻuokalani's trial
The Republic of Hawaii put their former queen on trial. The prosecution asserted that Liliʻuokalani had committed "misprision of treason," because she allegedly knew that guns and bombs for the Wilcox attempted counter-revolution had been hidden in the flower bed of her personal residence at Washington Place. She was sentenced to 5 years imprisonment at hard labor and a fine of $10,000. But the imprisonment was served in a small bedroom at ʻIolani Palace where she had a full-time maid-servant, and her "hard labor" consisted of composing songs and sewing a protest quilt containing symbols of the monarchy. After eight months she was paroled to her Washington Place home by President Sanford B. Dole. A year later she was granted a full pardon, including the right to travel; and President Dole gave her a passport to travel to Washington D.C. "to visit friends." However, she used that opportunity to lobby the U.S. Senate in 1897 against annexation.
[edit] Dissolution of the Republic
Upon the inauguration of William McKinley as president of the United States on March 4, 1897, the Republic of Hawaiʻi resumed negotiations for annexation, which continued into the summer of 1898. By this time, the President saw the islands as having gained a new strategic relevance in the wake of the Spanish-American War. On June 16 of that year, a new treaty of annexation was signed. As the Senate appeared uncertain to ratify the treaty, its supporters took extreme measures by passing the Newlands Resolution through which the cession was accepted, ratified and confirmed by a vote of 42 to 21. The House of Representatives accepted the Newlands Resolution by a vote of 209 to 91. McKinley signed the bill on July 7, 1898. The formal transfer of sovereignty took place on August 12, 1898 with the hoisting of the flag of the United States over ʻIolani Palace.
[edit] External links
- morganreport.org Online images and transcriptions of the entire Morgan Report
- Background of the petitions against Annexation
[edit] Notes
- ^ Daws, Gavan (1968). Shoal of Time: A History of the Hawaiian Islands. University of Hawaii Press, 278. ISBN 9780824803247.
- ^ Russ, William Adam (1992). The Hawaiian Revolution (1893-94). Associated University Presses, 335. ISBN 0945636431.
- ^ Tate, Merze (1965). The United States and the Hawaiian Kingdom: A Political History. Yale University Press, 253.
[edit] References
- Allen, Helena G. Sanford Ballard Dole: Hawaiʻi's Only President, 1844-1926 (1998).
- Kuykendall, Ralph Simpson. Hawaiʻi: A History, from Polynesian Kingdom to American State (2003)
- Schweizer, Niklaus R. His Hawaiian Excellency: The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Monarchy and the Annexation of Hawaiʻi (1994).
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| Ancient Hawaii • Kingdom of Hawaii • Provisional Government of Hawaii • Republic of Hawaii • Territory of Hawaii • State of Hawaii |  |
